Reddit is essentially an online bulletin board system first created in 2005. Reddit, headquartered in San Francisco, California, was acquired by Conde Nast Publications in 2006, Advance Publications in 2011, and has operated as an independent entity since 2012. The news and social networking giant allows registered members to submit content, including text posts and direct links. Registered users then vote content up and down based on merit as a way to organize posts on Reddit's pages. ‘Subreddits’ are content areas organized by interest. Examples of subreddits include news, gaming, movies, television, books, food, and photosharing, to name just a few of the over 9,000 available sub-categories.

Reddit has 36 million user accounts and 169 million unique visitors per month. There are currently over 9,000 active subreddits with an astounding 7.55 billion page views each month. Reddit, the self-proclaimed “Front Page of the Internet” may be the largest, most influential and most engaged website on the entire internet.

Reddit has tons of highly targeted ad inventory and rock bottom priced traffic potential. Reddit could easily be a marketer's dream, but it seems marketers are not seizing this golden opportunity. This may be attributable what' seen by some as Reddit's controversial reputation, or a subculture that can be regarded as somewhat odd. Advertisers may perceive launching a successful campaign on Reddit to be an uphill battle and not worth the risk - but in reality, it represents a huge opportunity - a wide open, often overlooked, platform waiting to be mined for prospects.

Reddit has an audience that continues to grow month after month, and those who manage to do advertising on Reddit well stand to benefit tremendously. Here are some tips on best practices for setting up a short or long term targeted campaign on Reddit.

1. Recognize your opportunities and understand where to place your Reddit advertising

Reddit users submit links on specific subreddits and other users can vote it up or down. Increasing a post's visibility depends on getting more upvotes than downvotes. Reddit users subscribe to subreddits and see a “front page” featuring the top posts in their subscribed subreddits.

Reddit advertising allows you to pay to have the top post or link on any subreddit. There are subreddits available on nearly any topic imaginable. This presents an awesome targeting opportunity that allows you to drill down to very specific categories and interests. For example, if you sell music equipment such as amps, pedals, strings, etc for guitarists, you can target subscribers to /r/guitar, /r/guitarpedals, /r/guitars, and /r/classicalguitar subreddits. These are people who will all be talking about and interested in guitar and guitar-related topics, and hence most interested in the products you may offer.

Using a dedicated online advertising company can be invaluable when attempting to leverage the power of Reddit. You can benefit from experts who are familiar with how to target the right subreddits and select the most effective content for your ads.

2. Understand what you're really buying.

When you buy Reddit advertising, you're buying the top post on the subreddit on which you're advertising. Your advertising campaign consists of one promotion on one subreddit for a predetermined amount of time. Ads are sold starting at 75 cents CPM, meaning you get a thousand views for 75 cents. For a mere 75 cents, your Reddit PPC advertisement will appear on a thousand front pages for those who've subscribed to the subreddits you've chosen to advertise in. The Reddit PPC model allows you to get your advertising in front of people interested in the topic your advertising at the same time they are actively thinking about that topic. That, combined with a strong ad, can turn into money in the bank. A minimum campaign budget is $5, maximum is $9,999.

3. Know where to find your audience.

Subreddits can be very specific and if you want exposure to that very specific audience, you have to know how to find them. You need to ensure you've located the right topic. Many subreddits link to other subreddits. Once you've found the big one, you can dig deeper into very specific subreddits.

You need to be sure the subreddit you choose has enough page views to meet the minimum spend. You can purchase up to 3 months in advance, but must spend a minimum of $5, with the cost of 75 cents per thousand page views. Basically, you'll need a subreddit with 6,600 page views over 3 months to run your Reddit PPC campaign. The subreddit you choose will need at 73 visits per day, and ideally a few dozen users online at any given time. You could also opt for a subreddit with 5,000 or more subscribers with relative safety.

Lastly, the subreddit needs to be small enough to be relevant to what you offer. For example, if you're running a contest for a new site visitor to win a new graphics card, your Reddit PPC ad will fail if you've placed it in a subreddit that offers help for basic computer beginners. This is not your target audience. Yes, you may sell computer parts, but those new to computers are not buying those parts. Experienced people who build their own computers are buying those parts. Dig deep to get into those smaller, but highly relevant subreddits.

Our online Reddit advertisement company is well positioned to assist advertisers in not only creating the appropriate content for their ads, but determining the most appropriate placements for those ads. You may not have the time or the expertise to do a Reddit deep dive, but we're very familiar with Reddit and its culture and we can assure your ad receives the highly targeted placement that drives traffic to your online business.

4. Creating your advertisements.

Creating a Reddit ad, or promotion, is much like creating a Reddit post. You'll write a headline and define a URL. The URL, of course, should be your landing page, or other specific page you choose. Ideally, your landing page, or other linked page, should have good design and a call to action. Let your ad messaging match your landing page. You can opt to do a test post instead of a link. This works well for those who want to engage the Reddit audience by encouraging comments and then responding to those comments. For most advertisers, a URL is your best bet.

5. Define the parameters of your campaign.

Decide how long your campaign will run, where it will run, and what is your budget. You can run one campaign per subreddit. When you create your ad, you'll be asked to type in the target subreddit. You can then select front page or targeted. Select targeted. You'll need to enter start and end dates, your budgeted amount for the ad, and impression. Impressions refer to the 1,000 views for 75 cents - another reason for knowing your audience, as discussed in step 3. It may seem complex, but it's really in knowing how to define the parameters.

As a professional team intimately familiar with Reddit, we are happy to assist you to ensure you get the best quality and most effectively targeted advertising for your marketing dollars.

6. Managing your Dashboard options.

It is at the Reddit Dashboard that you can upload a thumbnail to your ad, disable comments, and pay. You'll need a JPEG or PNG, 70x70. If you are prepared to respond to comments, you can leave them enabled, but if you are not prepared to respond, disable them. You'll also pay for your ads on the Dashboard. After you pay, the ad will be submitted for review. Ads normally go live within 2 days, and you're charged for the ad at that time.

7. Watch the Dashboard after the ad goes live.

You can monitor your ads on the Reddit Dashboard. An hour-by-hour impression and click data is available so you can see how your Reddit PPC ad is performing at any time. If you've enabled comments, watch for these and respond in a timely manner. Check Google Analytics to see what traffic from Reddit is doing on your site. This will give you a real feel for the success of your advertisement.

8. Look for ways to improve the ad, make changes, and then do it all again!

Once you've had a chance to monitor the Dashboard stats and see how the campaign affected traffic at your site, you can assess the ad's effectiveness and determine where you can improve it and then implement those changes. This may include better targeting of subreddits, a more compelling offer, or improving something at your website. Your first Reddit ad is an inexpensive learning opportunity that prepares you for greater success with each proceeding ad campaign.

Reddit offers a golden opportunity - that of a vast, rich, and largely untapped market for advertisers. To make the most of this opportunity, you must have a thorough understanding of Reddit, its culture, and how to effectively advertise to its users. You'll need compelling content, very specific targeting, and the patience to run some short term test ads to find what will have maximum effectiveness for you. The guide we offer here today is a general outline of Reddit advertising, since this is an often underutilized and misunderstood market with which many are unfamiliar.

Ultimately, the key to successful advertising is having the right team in your corner - a team that allows you to focus on doing what you do best, while we do what we do best. What do we do best? We can design advertisements ideally suited to to Reddit's PPC model and their unique format. We can assist with content, navigate Reddit to find the top subreddits best suited to target your ideal customer, and we can monitor and retool your ads for improved and ongoing success month after month.

We're in the business of helping your business maximize every opportunity for a highly successful ad campaign through whatever platform you choose. Let us be your online advertiser of choice and we'll move onward and upward together.